Thixocasting and rheocasting are widely used industrial processes for high volume production of SSM components. Problems associated with such processing include: costly and complex feed (process) material preparation (thixocasting); material loss (thixocasting), agglomeration, and grain coarsening during process material preparation (rheocasting), causing large grain size in the product; costly equipment to hold semi-solid slurry process material at constant temperatures (rheocasting); low solid fractions of process materials (rheocasting); and oxidation of process material during processing.